What happens as Speakers get broken in?

zx_toth

Hello,

I noticed that lately Ive been having to increase the amount that I turn the dial on my reciever to get the same amount of percieved volume from my speakers. Ive had my Polk 7300 series speakers for a little over a year and wonder is this the "breaking in" phenomenon? My concern is that the dial on reciver counts down -99 dB to -0 dB and I have to go down to -15 dB to get a volume that I find acceptable for action movies (which is admittedly loud)and think that there isnt much more to go if I continue to have this happen.

Im already thinking Ill need to upgrade these speakers if they dont produce what I wish in the future.

The speakers are great, very clear, no distortion at high volume just wondering about how this relates to the dial on my reciever in the future. I doubt the answer to my question is progressive hearing loss as I dont subject myself to deafening volumes

Thanks.

Zsolt

Bill Ayotte

What does your receiver put out WPC wise? You may want to look into getting a separate amp....

F1nut

Your speakers broke in a long time ago. Look elsewhere for the issue you're having.

Sherardp

maybe youre suffering for hearing loss. Time to bump up to RTi12s, they go plenty loud.

zx_toth

Bill Ayotte wrote: »

What does your receiver put out WPC wise? You may want to look into getting a separate amp....

Not sure what "WPC" stands for ... sorry. However my reciever is a Denon 2807. I will look through the manual and see if I can find this acronym and number.

Could you recommed an amp to go well with my Denon Reciever?

Thanks.

Bill Ayotte

WPC= Watts Per Channel.

The 2807 puts out 110WPC, It has pre-outs as well....Meaning you can pick up a more powerful amp to run your speakers...

zx_toth

In a product review I found on the Denon 2807 was the following:

"the AVR-2807 offers fully discrete amplification 110 WPC with a THD at a low 0.05% (untested). Processing is handled by a new 32-bit floating point DSP for 24-bit/192 kHz signals. "

Though it is only jibberish to me it may make sense to you

Zsolt

zx_toth

Oh yeah, WPC!! Watts Per Channel !! I should have clued in. Anyhow, a more powerful amp is the solution then.

Any good recommendations for amps? I will start looking through the forum for this information too.

Thanks Bill.

Zsolt

Bill Ayotte

Your speakers aren't what you are unhappy with....The Denon isn't putting enough power to them....Putting more power to them will make them sing...

Bill Ayotte

What is your price range? Sunfire, Nad, Parasound, and Adcom are good places to start. I would suggest hitting up www.audiogon.com , ebay, and your local craig's List...Going used can get you a lot more amp for the cash..

zx_toth

I could get away with $1500 for an amp without the wife-to-be noticing too much. Much more than that she would know Ill have to do all this at the same time I purchase my new HDTV in September as she is expecting large movement in the bank account at that time. Plenty of time for some good research.

Zsolt

Bill Ayotte

Here's a monster for ya:

http://cls.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?ampsmult&1183659256

dorokusai

It isn't break-in.

You don't need an external amplifier for the RM7300 series, that suggestion borders on medication time.

You have another problem. You should break out your user manual and ensure you have everything connected correctly. Next step would be to let the forum know what you have hooked up to the AVR-2807.

EDIT: No offense Bill but these speakers could fit in your underwear.

Yashu

You need MORE POWER (grunts like tim taylor).

The best deals around for more power are NAD in the audiophile world, and Outlaw Audio in the home theatre world.

engtaz

Adcom is another.

McLoki

I'm with Doro on this one. - for those speakers, power is not your issue.

First thing I would do is get a calibration disk like AVIA or Digital Video Essentials and calibrate your system. (If you don't have one, you will need to go to your local radio shack and get an SPL meter as well.)

100wpc is fine for those speakers and -15 is not really that bad. (that is what I typically listen to action movies at) Remember sound loudness is logrithmic, not linear. Even though your AVR goes from -99 to +10 (or so) almost all of your listening to DVD's will be in the -12 to -25 range. (once your system is calibrated)

Once you have a baseline set with an SPL meter you will have some actual repeatable numbers to go off of to see if you are actually losing volume or just hearing....

Good luck,

Michael

Edit - in case you don't know what an SPL meter is, here you go. This one happens to be digital, the one that I use is analog. Either will work fine.

zx_toth

Thanks for the advice everyone ...

Sounds like there are alot of opinions on the matter. They are certainly not behemoth speakers by any means but if I can squeeze a bit more out of them with an amp and also by getting an amp build a good audio/ HT foundation for future speaker upgrades than I'd be willing to put down the bucks. With the current 16 ' x 14 ' HT room I need to fit things into upgrading to the heavier duty LSi's and RTi's would be overkill until we move and I can claim a larger room as my own.

Dorokusai: Not sure if placing the speakers in my underwear would help the situation but I willing to try anything. Would boxers or briefs optimize the audio output

Zsolt

MillerLiteScott

No on the underwear but dirty socks hung over the tweeters will tame them down a bit:D

dorokusai

zx_toth wrote: »

Thanks for the advice everyone ...

Sounds like there are alot of opinions on the matter. They are certainly not behemoth speakers by any means but if I can squeeze a bit more out of them with an amp and also by getting an amp build a good audio/ HT foundation for future speaker upgrades than I'd be willing to put down the bucks. With the current 16 ' x 14 ' HT room I need to fit things into upgrading to the heavier duty LSi's and RTi's would be overkill until we move and I can claim a larger room as my own.

Dorokusai: Not sure if placing the speakers in my underwear would help the situation but I willing to try anything. Would boxers or briefs optimize the audio output

Zsolt

I like you already I honestly wouldn't worry about squeezing more out of those speakers with more power. The suggestion of calibration is solid but make sure you didn't enable a feature by mistake, like Mute or Soundfield(Church, Stadium, etc.) on the AVR.

Are you experiencing this loss in performance from ALL the speakers? Do you have a test tone feature you can run through on the 2807? If one or more of them sound worse than the others, muted and no "sizzle", you may have found your problem.

Which method are you using to connect the speakers? Subwoofer or AVR?

Bill Ayotte

dorokusai wrote: »

No offense Bill but these speakers could fit in your underwear.

That's cool....I should have looked up the speakers first...More power is never a bad thing though...:D

danger boy

make sure your receiver isn't in some kind of "midnight mode" or something like that.. night mode will lower the volume every damn time.

It could be one of the tweeters or other speaker in your system is toast. unplug all but one.. and turn up the volume.. unplug and that one, plug in the next one.. turn up the volume.. and do that for all speakers... only playing music thru one of them at a time. if there is a bad speaker somewhere.. you'll be able to hear it not sounding right.

Mother Mooch

MillerLiteScott wrote: »

No on the underwear but dirty socks hung over the tweeters will tame them down a bit:D

Lol, been there, Done that!

66chevyIISS

You know... I sometimes think that with my denon 1602. I really think it's my ears have adjusted so it doesn't seem as loud as it really is. I can watch the same thing a couple days later and it will seem really loud at the same volume.

Does anyone know if heat can affect this? It sometimes seems like the longer it's on the the more I have to turn it up. Again this might just be an illusion or me getting used to the volume it's playing at.

zx_toth

Mystery solved!! I finally had time to sit down and look over my system, run through the Audio setup function with the provided mic. I dont know much about audio but when the system calibration came back with the following readings I knew something was wrong

Channel Level Check:

Front Left +4.0 dB
Front Right +3.0 dB
Center +12.0
Subwoofer -12.0 ( I guess I like it bass-y :-) )
Surround Left +4.0
Surround Right +4.0

As one of the posters suggested: "Check the wires" ... I did and found that my gold Spade connect was loose due to the tension on the wire, which I relieved and tightened the connect.

Adjusted a few things and than got the following readings:

Channel Level Check:

Front Left +5.5 dB
Front Right +5.5 dB
Center +3.0
Subwoofer -12.0
Surround Left +6.0
Surround Right +6.5

Im going to do it a few more times to see as my placement of the mic varied the surrounds so I standardize it a bit better but the Center Channel was definately the cuplrit in this case.

I will be looking to upgrade my front speakers after I get a HDTV and stand in late August and will be asking a slew of questions in preparation for that but until than thanks for the help!

Best regards,

Zsolt

McLoki

Awesome - glad you found the issue. Pull up a chair and stick around.

Michael

Bill Ayotte

Hey, if you are looking for an HDTV, make sure you check out www.secondact.biz before you buy anything....You can get some killer deals there....Oh yeah, go LCD too..I am JUST NOW getting a replacement through CC for my DLP....Man, have I learned my lesson.....

zx_toth

McLoki wrote: »

Awesome - glad you found the issue. Pull up a chair and stick around.

Michael

I will certainly stick around, as Ive been a bit frustrated with my lack of audio / video knowledge and wish to see if some of your guys' wisdom can brush off on me.

The only problem with hanging around is I keep wanting to upgrade my system the more I know and hear about your guys' systems Bill Ayotte has gotten that in my mind and Ive been fairly feverishly been looking at possible amps, sub upgrades, and front speaker upgrades .... Im easily influenced to buy things However I am a home theater kind of guy (yes one of those) so the two channel stuff is a bit alien to me at this point ... though I am intrigued.

Zsolt

Bill Ayotte

zx_toth wrote: »

I will certainly stick around, as Ive been a bit frustrated with my lack of audio / video knowledge and wish to see if some of your guys' wisdom can brush off on me.

The only problem with hanging around is I keep wanting to upgrade my system the more I know and hear about your guys' systems Bill Ayotte has gotten that in my mind and Ive been fairly feverishly been looking at possible amps, sub upgrades, and front speaker upgrades .... Im easily influenced to buy things However I am a home theater kind of guy (yes one of those) so the two channel stuff is a bit alien to me at this point ... though I am intrigued.

Zsolt

You may just go broke here...:D

A lot of the guys here trade up often, so there are usually good deals to be found in the Flea Market if you are looking....If you are looking to get the most for your money, buying used is a good idea, from the FM or any other place...I would stick to new or refurb with the TVs though, they seem to have enough problems straight out of the box (DLP at least) without the human factor....I run a 2ch. setup with a sub for my "HT" rig...My Sunfire died about two weeks ago, and I had an extra 2 ch pre-amp laying around, along with an old video switch...I am now thinking about selling the Sunfire after I get it fixed, and going with something along the lines of Krell integrated with a nice component video switcher...Odd how you travel in this hobby...:)